This Week on GRadio
by C.L. Cook - GRadio.Substack.com
Last week, US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio promised a “big, fast, effective” and “whole-of-government” American response to the twin, dinner hour earthquakes that struck near Venezuela’s capital Wednesday last.
Delcy Rodriguez’s interim government welcomed foreign help in rescue efforts for the disaster; responsible for the deaths so far of an estimated 1,700 hundred people - a toll expected to grow much higher in the coming days, as more than 40,000 Venezuelans are reported missing through unofficial databases.
Disaster teams from Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and El Salvador were joined by brigades from Colombia, Brazil, the US, and other countries. But Rubio’s “whole-of-government” remark opens the prospect of an expanded and worrying American militarization of Venezuela’s calamity.
Ricardo Vaz is a journalist, political analyst and contributor with the communication collectives Tatuy Tv and Utopix. His articles appear regularly at Venezuelanalysis.com. His latest there is, ‘Venezuela: Earthquake Death Toll Rises, US SOUTHCOM Deploys Military Assets’.
Thousands reported missing following the collapse of dozens of buildings in La Guaira. (Archive)
Ricardo Vaz in the first half.
And; just how ready is Canada for disaster? Last week, the Carney government announced the launch of an expanded atomic energy project, seeing sixties-era CANDU nuclear plants upgraded, while new, never-seen-in-Canada Small Modular Reactors are built at Darlington’s decades-old facility in Bowmanville, Ontario, with other sites, from coast to coast to coast promised to follow.
SMR proponents are quick to reassure, the new “CANDU’s” can NOT become the Three-Mile Island’s, Chernobyl’s, or Fukushima’s of the future. But still, there are those who council caution.
Professor M. V. Ramana is the Simons Chair in Disarmament, Global and Human Security at the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs at the University of British Columbia. He was too Director pro tem for the school this past academic year.
Small Modular Reactor “Roadmap”
Professor M. V. Ramana and a January, 2021 interview we did on the then-new plans of Justin Trudeau’s Liberals to take Canada’s nuclear smaller with SMRs in the second half.
But first, Ricardo Vaz and the twin tragedies to befall Venezuela.
Music: David Rovics/Kamala Emanuel
Song: ‘Venezuela’
CodePink Venezuela Relief
Chris Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, broad/webcasting since 1999. Check out the Archive at GRadio.Substack.com, and the GR blog at:
https://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.com/
@GRadio at UpScrolled, and on Telegram at: https://t.me/gorillaradio2024
